Amazon Is Going to Sell Ebooks Outside the Kindle Store

Paid Content shared the news, that Amazon is planning to publish a series of short biographies, called Amazon Lives, which won’t be exclusive to Kindle Store.

In other words: they will be available for sale at other etailers.

This is a beginning of the big thing. This series is just a little sign of it. The first book will be published in June 2013, so it’s a long time to go, but the intentions of the online giant are clear. Amazon wants to sell as much content as possible – and to do that they are willing to open up.

Unlike all of the other e-books that Amazon has published so far, the “Amazon Lives” series will not be exclusive to the Kindle Store. The NYT first reported this and Amazon confirmed it, telling me, “The books will be available to be sold everywhere in all formats.”

Other ebookstores don’t usually support mobi format. One thing this move means is that the books for open distribution will be prepared in epub format as well.

But it also can mean, and I very much hope it will happen, that Amazon on their way to openness, will bless epub for Kindle ecosystem.